Comments (4)

By Rebecca, September 18, 2009 11:08 am

Last month, Daisy posted about straight people – usually women – “in a relationship” with people of the same gender. From the comments:

I’m quite sure that these women aren’t trying to trivialize lesbian relationships — I just think that’s the result. In order to have people I don’t know well take seriously my listing on FB as “in a relationship” with my girlfriend, I need to also list myself as “interested in women.” I find this annoying, because I’m not interested in anyone but my girlfriend. If the majority of female/female relationship pairings on FB weren’t jokes, no one would assume mine was a joke too.

While I hadn’t really considered the nature of Facebook relationships before, I agree that placing non-romantic same-sex relationships on Facebook on the same footing as romantic relationships has the ultimate effect of diluting those actual romantic relationships.

Earlier this week, I was at a bar with some friends and one of them had to go outside for a few minutes for a phone call. Someone asked who she’d been talking with and she said, “Oh, my wife.” She and I had talked about this a while ago, before Daisy’s post, because I noticed on Facebook that she and this friend were listed as “Married.”

She’d said that their relationship was really that close, that they were much more intimate than mere friends, and that – no – the weren’t actually romantically involved; they both identify as ‘straight.’

I didn’t really give it much thought at the time but, because of Daisy’s post, I’ve reconsidered. This friend and I are actually on pretty close footing in terms of how we view feminism and sexism in American culture, and have had good discussions about how to deal with sexist jokes made by friends (or friends of friends). I’d kind of like to bring this discussion up, and maybe I will when I see her this weekend, but I’m not sure how, or what specifically I’d hope to accomplish.

Comments (1)

By Rebecca, January 16, 2009 4:04 pm

Something I just posted on a Slashdot discussion on Prop 8…

I’d imagine you’re aware of the usual response to that, but I think it’s important enough that it bears repeating.

Whether or not being gay is a preference/choice or biologically determined is is irrelevant to the arguments in favor of gay marriage. Regardless of the cause of homosexuality, the government should not be in the business of regulating the behavior of consenting adults or discriminating based on said behavior.

In general, the argument for marriage only being valid for a man and a woman revolves around child-rearing. If that’s the case, it’s odd that so many of the legal and financial rights/privileges granted by marriage do not directly relate to child reading and, indeed, apply regardless of whether or not the married couple has children, ever plans to have children, or even can have children. For example, my mom is now past child-bearing age. Does that mean she shouldn’t be allowed to get (re)married?

So please don’t act like qualifying homosexuality as a preference and talking about the rights of gay men and women to marry people of the opposite sex as if it takes the wind out of the sails of gay marriage proponents. It doesn’t.

-R

PS – As a side note, part of a well-functioning government’s role is to protect minorities from tyranny of the majority [wikipedia.org]. So while you’re right, a minority population can’t count on the state’s protection, it’s not unreasonable to expect such protection in the (theoretical) ‘ideal’ state.